Todd Dills

Air Force drivers haul the Iraq withdrawal

They’re “working overtime now with the 31 December deadline,” says Melissa Milner with U.S. Air Forces Central. Last week, she notified me of a special feature on their website detailing the hauling efforts of the Air Force’s 70th Medium Truck Detachment, charged with moving massive amounts of materiel out of Iraq before the end of the year. They’ve stepped up missions nearly threefold in the last few months, from about 11 a month in January 2011 to “34 to 40” throughout the fall of the year, according to Lt. Colonel John O’Connor.

This month, O’Connor added, they were expecting as many as 60 total missions — hauls from bases and other locations in country, aided in some instances by civilian Iraqi haulers, as at least one picture in the below gallery attests. Check out the photos, all taken by Air Force Master Sergeant Jeffrey Allen (including the above shot of U.S. Air Force Tech. Sergeant David Perez, convoy commander of the 70th MTD, at the U.S. military’s equivalent of a truck stop post-convoy), for a spectacular window into some of the missions.

And I’d recommend reading, too, Air Force Staff Sergeant David Salanitri’s story about the 70th detachment, where further photos are also available, via this page.

A shipping container loaded with supplies and equipment is loaded on to a U.S. Air Force M915 tractor trailer at Joint Base Balad, Iraq on Oct. 29, 2011. (U.S. Air Force Photo/Master Sgt. Jeffrey Allen)

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Todd Dills

Todd Dills is Senior Editor of Overdrive magazine and writes from Nashville, Tenn. He frequently covers business, regulatory and lifestyle topics for the magazine and at OverdriveOnline.com. His work on the “CSA’s Data Trail” series in Overdrive about the federal CSA program was awarded the highest honor in trade journalism – the “Grand Neal” – by American Business Media at the 2014 Jesse H. Neal Awards. Dills’ Channel 19 blog covers a grab bag of on-highway hearsay, owner-operator news and driver views from the roadways the nation over. His work in trucking journalism builds on a background of news feature, fiction and other creative writing and editing. Find him here at the Channel 19 blog and via his Twitter feed, or send tips to tdills@randallreilly.com or via phone at 205-907-2481.